<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>He Does this On Purpose by Vaguely_downwards</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/30070512">He Does this On Purpose</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vaguely_downwards/pseuds/Vaguely_downwards'>Vaguely_downwards</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Book 5: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, F/M, First Kiss, Smoking</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 18:42:30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>709</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/30070512</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vaguely_downwards/pseuds/Vaguely_downwards</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Remus and Tonks have a habit of wandering off. So does Remus' mind. </p><p>Experimental piece.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Remus Lupin/Nymphadora Tonks</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>26</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>He Does this On Purpose</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Mixing it up again. <br/>I'm not sure how I feel about this one, but I've written it regardless. <br/>Any and all comments would be greatly appreciated.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>They’re sat outside again, the two of them. Grimmauld Place’s garden isn’t large, a cold stone slab and nothing more. Weeds have cracked their way through the concrete, wilted in the dark and the freezing November air. They’re on the back step again, knees flushed and elbows knocking. He wonders if he does this to himself on purpose.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s talking again, gesturing with her cigarette. He’s transfixed by the movement of the glowing embers in the dark and he can’t focus because her hand brushes his legs and takes all of his oxygen with it when it leaves.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But he wants to listen, because he always does. Waits and listens to every word from her mouth. Every story and secret she passes specifically to him in the dark he stores away and hordes. He has rooms of them within him and he wants to listen, to treasure this one too.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He watches her mouth, the way she barely stops to take a drag of the cigarette before talking again. He’s jealous of the way it’s allowed to get that close to her, held between her lips. He wonders if he does this to himself on purpose.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There are no stars in London, the sky is an inky blanket pulled around their shoulders as he drags his eyes from her- from one universe to the other. </span>
  <span>It’s easier to think when he’s not looking directly at her, as though she is the sun and to stare is to burn. Though it makes him ache.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They’d been doing this a lot, sneaking out after Order meetings together, away from prying eyes. Just him and her and what</span>
  <em>
    <span> this </span>
  </em>
  <span>is squeezed in the gaps between them. He’s found himself looking forward to moments like this, counting down the minutes and seconds until the next, until he’s with her. And he doesn’t know how it happened because attraction has him running in the other direction, but all roads seem to lead back here, knees pressed together, exchanging secrets in the dark and the cold like a currency only they share. And he’s not sure why her and why now except of course her and of course now – nothing else has ever, will ever, exist.  He wonders if he does this to himself on purpose.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When he pulls his eyes from the cosmos, she is looking at him expectantly, one eyebrow quirked and a smile pulling at the corner of her mouth. He wants to kiss it from her lips until hers becomes his.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And maybe that’s the problem.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He can only take, there’s nothing for him to give. She has the job and the youth, the humour and the life and all he can do is take. Take until there’s nothing left of the woman before him, until the pink hair bleeds away and she’s simply a reflection of his own bad decisions.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But he wants to </span>
  <em>
    <span>give</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>To take her to his room and give until he had nothing left. To give her everything she’s ever wanted and has ever deserved and more.  Wants her to take and take and take.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She says his name, she’s frowning at him now, a crease between her eyebrows. But the sound has set the most glorious fireworks alight through his veins, sheer energy crackling in his fingers. What the sky lacked in stars she’s made up for in her eyes and he knows it cliché but he can’t look away. He wonders if he does this to himself on purpose.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His movements feel sluggish, like wading through treacle but also instinctual. He couldn’t stop his hands now if he tried. He lets them, daring them and encouraging them, cradle her jaw beneath his palm, his thumb tracing its outline so faintly it’s more a suggestion than a touch. She’s cold and he knows he is too as he draws her face up, draws her closer. He freezes in place, giving her the change to run, to flee, to slap him and leave him on the stone step alone. She doesn’t move, she barely breathes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The urge to kiss her pounces.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And he gives in, pressing their lips together.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And he gives and gives and gives.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wonders if he does this to himself on purpose.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>